Economic Statistics as Technology of Distance ? On the travel of measurements from the USA to Israel During the 50?s.

The empirical case of this paper is about standardizing economies of developed and peripheral states such as Israel by adopting UN categories of national account during the 50?s. Consequently, a paradigmatic shift during the 50?s changed the conception of the Israeli ?economy?, few years after the establishment of the state. While the old system of economic measurements described the local economy in simple categories and measurement units, the new system had a very abstract format of categories and measurements and it concealed its social and political context. The context for the adoption of national-account-system of measurement was the pressures the American government put on the Israeli government claiming that an American support would be guaranteed only if the Israeli government internationalizes its economy and makes it legible. However, external coerciveness cannot be the only explanation for the question why international statistics were adopted by a peripheral state. I argue that a coalition between specific local Israeli experts, i.e., economists and the first state statisticians, seeking for a scientific monopoly, and specific political actors, i.e., the first prime minister, seeking for legitimacy, were important actors in the acceptance of the American economic system. Theoretically, I examine neo-institutionalism and STS as explanations [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]